Broadcast Assassin

This is an anime/manga called Yu Yu Hakusho.

Little known fact: In another life, I helped make a collectible card game (CCG) for this.

Other CCGs I worked on in one capacity or another over the 90’s (mostly community management, playtesting, and game design):

Star Wars (Decipher)

Star Trek (Decipher)

Highlander (Thunder Castle Games)

Imajica (Harper Prism, based on the Clive Barker book)

Aliens vs. Predator (Harper Prism/Precedence Publishing)

Buffy: the Vampire Slayer (Score Entertainment)

Angel (Score, never published)

Dragonball Z (Score)

Dragonball GT (Score)

Inuyasha (Score)

And maybe one or two more that I’m forgetting.

Here’s a secret: creating a successful gaming product is about engagement, community building, and customer support. Casual players make up a significant percentage of the revenue, but the real momentum is driven by a core group of hardcore evangelists and fans.

In other words, there are lots of principles I learned during my time in the CCG industry that I apply regularly to my current focus in original online entertainment.

While web video and webseries are in their infancy, most of the fundamentals of what we’re doing are not new concepts. Success in this space may come from studying related principles in other industries that came before, from television to gaming to the pre-feature serials that packed the theaters in the 30s and 40s to who-knows-what-your-guess-is-as-good-as-mine.

Learn from the past, live in the present, dictate the future.